Resident Evil: Lazulinus
by CradleUnderTheStar
Summary: Renowned virologist Rebecca Chambers is giving the commencement speech at a small northeastern research university. Amid the shadows of a crumbling amusement park and the mind-numbing drone of peculiar blue cicadas, citizens have begun to go missing. When the retired police officer discovers a conspiracy all too familiar for comfort, can she rely on her old abilities to save her?
1. Awakening

Its towering appendages and crooked joints pierced the sky at bizarre, unnerving angles, casting the overgrown foliage at its feet in long, dire strands of darkness. The face roared out from above the tree line, blocking out the setting sun and casting the world in a cold, blue twilight. It was an enormous, dead-eyed thing. Rotting white flesh and a sinister blood-red streak of a mouth locked eternally in a toothy mirthless grin. The wooden Ferris wheel and the painted, weather-beaten clown adorning its center had maintained the same silent vigil for forty years, and they might continue to do so for forty years more. But for now, they were remnants, mockeries of glory long faded and a past long gone.

Running a hand through her hair, the woman squinted at them before casting her view back to the poster on the train station wall. _Welcome to Woodpine:_ _Home of the Famous Fantasyland_. There were crowds, parents and children, laughing teenagers. They were locked in time there on the wall, faded ghosts.

The woman cast her gaze away again, gnawing on her lower lip and running her eyes over the luggage piled at her feet. She was slight with a slender sort of athleticism, visible only in the muscle just barely poking out from beneath the tanned skin of her exposed arms. Her hair was brown, shaggy and somewhat unkempt, hastily tied up in a low bun that morning and left to fend for itself.

But Rebecca Chambers had learned not to put too much stake in her looks. A professional sort of mess forced people to look past the lack of height, past the scars littering her hands, and past the dark circles beneath her eyes. It forced them to see her, not her clothing, not her hair, not her femininity. But they would, of course, always whisper. _Poor dear. Little girl._ _Her?_ _ **She**_ _lived through Raccoon City? They let her on the_ _ **police force**_ _? Well what does she do now?_

Startled from these thoughts, the woman jumped as the bug scuttled by her foot. The large, elegant insect skittered its way past in a blur of shimmering blue before taking flight and disappearing into the swamp ahead. Rebecca sighed, crossing her arms and allowing the comforting weight of her cellphone to bob against her thigh. Maybe she ought to call them, let them know she had arrived. But _of course_ she had arrived. This was the last stop on the dreary Northeastern line, and she had been the sole passenger left on the train when the conductor called it out. _God._ She still hated trains.

"Dr. Chambers?"

The voice was tentative, uncertain, and Rebecca looked up as if she had imagined it. But lingering there at the far end of the station, clutching the back of a bench, was a young woman. She stood rigidly, peering out over her freckles through a thick pair of glasses. Auburn hair hung limply down over her shoulders, and despite the intrinsic strength apparent in her limbs, she sunk backward on herself, fingers playing idly against the faded wood.

"Yes. Are you from the university?" Rebecca spoke up, an almost overeager smile playing across her face. When the stranger seemed reluctant to initiate further contact, she took a few steps forward, outstretching a hand to shake. This maneuver seemed to rattle the new arrival into reality, and she hurriedly moved forward to meet her.

"Yes. Yes, I am. Oh gosh, I just…I really can't believe you're _here_. Rebecca Chambers. Dr. _Rebecca Chambers_ giving our commencement speech. I just…I really admire your work. Your research in virology has…" the young woman trailed off, letting her hand go with an embarrassed simper. "Yes, well…My name is Siobhan Long. I'm a student at Woodpine University. Well, until graduation on Monday, I guess. I'm your escort." She laughed and tucked her hair behind her ear.

"It's nice to meet you, Siobhan," Rebecca smiled weakly. "I was beginning to think no one was going to come."

"Well, our professor's car broke down, so I had to walk here. It's not very far. You can see it right there," Siobhan replied quickly, bringing up a hand to point at a distant cluster of trees. A dull gray roof seemed to poke out between the leaves.

"Oh…well, then maybe we'd better start off before it gets dark, huh?" Rebecca squinted into the fleeting sun once before hurrying over to gather her luggage into her arms.

"I can help with those!"

"It's really no trouble. I can manage," Rebecca replied, ducking down to gather her belongings.

However, before she could object further, Siobhan had moved quickly in beneath her and begun lifting the two parcels into her arms. She cocked her head forward as an indication to follow, and all at once, the pair was making their way down a splintering set of wooden steps off the platform.

"I didn't realize there was an amusement park here," Rebecca remarked casually, casting a final, forlorn glance at the Ferris wheel in the distance. She grimaced as if imitating the clown at its hub.

"Well, it's been closed up since the 1980s or so. There were a few accidents that summer, and people stopped coming," Siobhan explained with an odd sort of glumness. Making a sharp left, she hurried up another set of stone stairs before emerging onto what seemed to be a main street, dotted with faded little shops and heavy with the scent of seawater. "People used to think the swamp had healing properties. It used to be a real big tourist town, you know? But...I guess it all sort of tapered off. It's really just the university and research lab now."

"Ah, I see," Rebecca mused softly, casting her eyes around. _No one's out on a Saturday evening._ "Are we near the beach?"

"It's just a short walk in that direction. I can show you later if you like. It's nice, you know. Quiet. There's this great lighthouse," Siobhan smiled over her shoulder. By now, some of the nervousness seemed to have disappeared from her limbs, and her gait, while stilted, had gained a new degree of sincerity.

"Well, maybe," Rebecca smiled, pushing a stray strand of hair out of her face. Looking to the right, she caught her reflection in the murky window of a drug store. God, the years had made her slight, had lent an arch to her shoulders and a heaviness to her walk that defied the youth she remembered once possessing. Still, the woman could focus on herself for only a few seconds. There were posters, people of all ages, men, women, and children—missing.

Rebecca cast an uncertain glance at her partner, but Siobhan was moving easily ahead, suitcases still tucked firmly in her deceptively strong grasp. Rebecca gnawed at her lower lip a moment, ducking in a bit to examine the smiling photo of a young man. He was slight, flaxen haired, last seen about a month earlier in what the woman assumed was a neighboring town. At the very least, she thought she recalled passing through it on the three-hour train ride.

Her thoughts were silenced abruptly as another large, blue insect hurried across the glass, pausing in her field of view and letting out a low, whirring buzz. Rebecca let out a gasp and stumbled back.

"Ah!" she stammered, cheeks glowing red with embarrassment. _Pull yourself together, Chambers._ Stopping in place, Siobhan turned to glance over her shoulder, offering a smile that seemed almost apologetic before jogging up beside her charge. She sunk her head in to examine the winged intruder before it tried to fly away.

"Oh, don't worry. That's the blue cicada. _Tibicen Lazulinus_. They're native only to this region, you know. I've done all my research on them," the young student explained, watching as the thing finally took flight and disappeared into the air. She watched after it with an almost nostalgic smirk. "Their blue coloring is a genetic abnormality."

"Is that so?" Rebecca asked, quirking her brow.

"That and their large size. They molt much more often than most species; they're constantly growing. Thankfully, their life spans run out before they get much bigger than the average cockroach," Siobhan offered with a small nod. Letting out a breath, she shifted her weight from one foot to the other as if the luggage were suddenly becoming too heavy for her. "I haven't been able to pinpoint it yet, but…I have a hypothesis that their genetic mutations are viral in origin. Something new, you know? Like that one they found in flatworms a while ago. That's why your work has been such an inspiration."

"Well, thanks again, Siobhan. That really does mean a lot. Are you sure I can't take one of those? It's really no trouble. I did pass basic training back in the day," Rebecca grimaced, but before giving the other woman a chance to refuse, she snagged one of the suitcases out of her arms and held it behind her back. Siobhan simpered, readjusting herself and regaining a more natural, less encumbered stance.

"Well, you're the guest. Whatever you say. The university's only a few more blocks in that direction, I promise," she chirped, cocking her head onward and starting back down the sidewalk. Rebecca kept a steady pace at her heels, taking in her surroundings as she went.

Woodpine was a rotting little town, isolated and bearing a heavy, lingering dampness that settled over the buildings and made the wood warp toward the ground. The businesses were old, quaint, mom and pop stores that may have served the community for the better part of the last century.

A ramshackle little dry cleaner with outdated blouses, long ago sun-bleached, hanging in the window. A grocery store with bins of fruit touched only by flies. An old man in an apron stepped through the automatic doors and ran a forearm over his brow before setting about dragging a basket of bananas inside. Across the street was a diner with dull florescent lights surrounding a sign just beginning to blink to life as the sun crawled the rest of the way over the horizon's tip.

"Is it always so quiet around here? Not that I'm a city slicker or anything," Rebecca asked with a short laugh, looking to her left and right before following Siobhan across a mostly dead street. A grimy blue pickup truck chugged by after they had gone, the driver, a burly young man in a cap, casting them a glance as he went.

"Well, it's not the most exciting town, no. I hear it used to be, but I don't know. I'm from New Jersey myself. I came for the cicadas," the young student explained with a shrug. "That's not true, per say. But the university has one of the largest entomology labs in the United States."

"Yes, I remember reading about that. How did you get into insects?"

"Oh, when I was growing up…we had a bee problem. Every year, my mother would knock down the hive, and sure enough, every year, they'd build it right back up. I got stung a lot trying to get a proper look. In any case, all of this is really Professor Shaw's doing. He's the head of biology, and he's the one that arranged for you to come."

"We spoke on the phone."

"He was supposed to come pick you up, but the car, you know? He really revitalized the research program here. I just wish that it had revitalized the town too. There's not much to do but lock yourself in the lab all hours. And drink."

She added the last few words with a laugh, extending a hand to decrepit-looking liquor store being managed by a heavyset woman in a floral dress.

"It's all locals," Siobhan continued. "I think most people must have lived here for decades. Everyone knows everything about everyone else."

"I can imagine that," Rebecca laughed. A sudden wind rustled her hair and clothing, and while it served to lift some of the stagnancy from the air, it also sent a chill rolling through her, a dire, frigid feeling that dug its claws into her spine and climbed the rest of the way up her back to her neck.

Stepping off the curb and into another crosswalk, Rebecca abruptly stopped herself and began to stare. The sign rose out of the ground like a phantom and scratched at the trees above, swaying in the breeze and letting out a hollow, joyless creak.

The letters scrawled across it blazed an unpleasant red, and the gold which surrounded them had long ago chipped away. _Fantasyland_. Rebecca narrowed her eyes, lingering a moment to take in the same faded husk of a Ferris wheel, the dusty canvas coverings of old "test your skill" games, the plywood towers of a sealed haunted house attraction. A lost world, once full of life, now just a macabre imitation of what one had been. Her thoughts flickered in that moment to the imposing iron gates of the Raccoon Zoo.

She had only seen it passingly that night, on her way out the city. But the contrast had been enough. But then there was a noise, a low, painful sound interrupting her grim nostalgia. A shout, followed by the thud of what may have been sneakers on dirt.

"Dr. Chambers. This way," Siobhan spoke up once she realized that her partner was lagging behind. However, Rebecca brought up a hand as a signal for silence. Knitting her brow, she placed her suitcase on the ground before taking a few steps down the overgrown path to the sealed metal gate. Chains hung rusty and loose from the bars, centralizing there in a silver padlock.

Rebecca pressed herself up against them, trying to get a better look inside. However, nothing but heavy quiet hung in the air, and despite her efforts to crane her neck, the fence prevented a proper view of the park's interior.

"Did you hear that?" she whispered, voice echoing dryly in the back of her throat. "I thought I heard someone."

"I didn't hear anything," Siobhan replied, looking around as if to see if anyone were watching. Seeing no one, she jogged up to the fence, Rebecca's suitcase tucked snugly beneath her arm. "It could be the wind. Or…there's frogs this time of year."

"It wasn't a frog. It was…" Rebecca murmured, voice fading when another pained, undeniably human whimper skirted by on the wind, echoing from somewhere nearby. "There! I know I heard it this time! Hello! Is someone there?"

There was a response, low, barely audible, a phantom of the breeze. But it was there. A scream, low, throaty, and terrified, hidden in the bowels of that abandoned, macabre theme park.

"I…I didn't hear anything. Really, Dr. Chambers. We can call the police or something if you really think…," Siobhan replied hurriedly, but Rebecca had already begun tugging on the gate. The lock rattled defiantly, but it would not budge.

"Shit," the older woman mumbled, stepping back and running her hands through her hair. "There's someone in there."

"I think we should call someone."

"Alright. You go do that then," Rebecca replied with a sharp nod. "If they're hurt, I know first-aid." _Understatement of the century, Chambers._

"Well, yes, but…"

"Siobhan, just do what I say, okay? Call someone. I'm just going to try to find a way inside. It'll be alright."

"I…No. No, I'll come too. I don't want to let you go off alone. If we find something, I have my cellphone. We can call the police," Siobhan replied sharply, biting on her lip. Looking to Rebecca for approval, she gently placed the suitcase on the ground.

The older woman nodded once before beginning to move around the surrounding fence, searching for any spaces in the bars through which she might weasel her way. Her efforts were rewarding only a few moments later when she came upon a rusted piece of metal sticking out among the others. Taking it into her hands, the woman grunted, twisting it in her grasp until she could pry loose in her palms with minimal effort. _You still got it, Chambers_.

"This way," she whispered, stepping through the newly made crevice. Her sneakers kicked up dirt as she went. And looking around, she listened intently, searching for a clue, anything to indicate someone was indeed nearby. "Hello! Is there someone in here? Do you need help?"

"I don't hear anything," Siobhan repeated softly, coming up behind her and brushing dust from the front of her shorts. She hugged herself close as she weaved through the crumbling stalls, tattered, weather-beaten stuffed animals dangling from threadbare ropes overhead.

"Hello!" Rebecca shouted again, ignoring her as she took off jogging, poking her head around what seemed to be the crumbling cement corpse of a restroom building. The air reeked of forgotten sewage, pungent and stagnant, like garbage left outside to fester.

Siobhan brought a hand up to wrap in her shirt, bunching the fabric and using it to hide her nose. A gag lingered in the back of her throat, but she braced herself and firmly decided she would not allow it to escape. A shiver rolled through her, hair prickling on her freckled skin.

"Maybe I _was_ hearing things," Rebecca mumbled dumbly, taking a few steps back. She glanced around and slumped. "Come on. Let's get out of here. I'm really sorry about this. I thought I really…"

Before she could continue, however, the whimpering returned, a cold, animalistic noise echoing from nearby. It was louder, fuller, and it seemed to bounce, reverberating off unseen walls. Siobhan's eyes widened, ruddy cheeks gaining a new pallid shade of white as she brought up an outstretched hand, extending a quivering finger to point blankly ahead. The men's room.

Rebecca nodded, bringing up a palm as if to tell the young woman to stay in place. However, Siobhan insisted on lingering close by as her companion positioned herself in the bathroom doorway.

Rebecca blinked in the sudden, moldy darkness, eyes skating over broken tiles and grotesque, overflowing urinals. Homeless people must have made their home there at some time. Cardboard and food wrappings lingered on the floor in addition to scattered trash and human or animal feces. The smell was overpowering, vomit-inducing. Rebecca found a lump rising from her stomach, but she quickly quelled it, straightening her shoulders and insisting on composure.

"Hello?" Rebecca called, voice echoing dully off the cavernous space. "Do you need help? Is someone in here?"

Her eyes adjusted in the stray beams filtering in from the open doorway, but even as she caught the movement out the corner of her eye, the sound startled her. It was a clank, violent and metallic, the stall door flying open as a humanoid figure stumbled out.

"Ah!" Siobhan yelped, clutching onto Rebecca's shoulders, from which she was promptly shaken as the older woman took a step forward.

"Oh my God. Are you okay? Sir?" Rebecca whispered. The figure seemed to struggle to its feet, writhing there on the gritty tile floor. It was a man, young and thin. Wispy blond hair clung to his head, and in that moment, Rebecca seemed to recognize him. Her mouth fell open. "The missing poster…"

The man cocked his head up, sudden and jerky, moving as if he could not control his appendages. His face was sunken, and his eyes were hollow, staring past the two women there and into some vague, distant ether. All at once a horrible, animalistic noise erupted from his mouth before fading into a barely audible grunt. He stared, mouth a black hole. And then he fell, flopping to the ground with a dull thud as blood began to pool, dark and shimmering, around his motionless head.

"Siobhan….Siobhan, call the police," Rebecca breathed, stumbling backward and flashing her companion a look. However, the other woman stood frozen in the doorway. Her breathing was shallow, heavy and deep in her ribcage, and as the seconds crept by, it only grew more frantic, culminating in a long, terrified scream that reverberated deafeningly off the room's confines.

Rebecca turned back just in time to see what was to blame. The man's shirt was becoming a sickly shade of black, liquid seemingly pouring out from an unseen fissure in his back. It began to soak the floor with blood and pus. His frame trembled violently, and another inhuman moan echoed from his mouth. That was when the lump appeared. It vanished again after only a second. But then it was back with greater gusto. Rebecca gasped, voice dry. Something was pressing up on his shirt _from beneath_.

"Siobhan…Go. Get back," the woman cried sharply and with hurried breaths, pressing the young student back toward the doorway with all her strength. However, she got no farther than the threshold. There was a cry.

A bladed appendage sprung through the fallen man's shirt and tore the fabric in two as the room filled with a dreadful buzzing noise, echoing off the ceiling. It gave the impression of numbers, of more noises than there actually were, a frightful, terrifying illusion.

And then the hidden beast clawed its way out the man's carcass, leaving the human form nothing but an empty, fallen husk. In a flurry of gore and noise, it dug its claws into the tile, tearing them up as it birthed itself from the stranger's back, now nothing more than a mess of bones and entrails.

Rebecca could only see it in parts. Tiny gleaming eyes. Long insect- like legs. Pincers. Stubs on its back, a mockery of what may have been wings. It flopped forward, skittering onto four clawed legs. And with a high-pitched, guttural shriek, it scuttled forward in a shapeless blur of deep, bloodied blue.


	2. Breed

Rebecca stared. For a few moments, all she could do was stand with wide eyes and clenched fists, watching as the monster clawed its way toward her. But as the beast drew near, her mind finally seemed to comprehend it. Strange limbs and discordant parts combined to create a single macabre image. The thing was humanoid, at least partially. It crawled like an adult on all-fours, but its thin, leg-like appendages would perhaps not support its weight if it tried to stand.

Ragged dark hairs jutted out its crevices, but the strands on its head were blond, a frighteningly human growth pattern jutting out a decidedly inhuman head. Its exoskeleton and the thick layer of blood coating it shimmered in the half-light.

Rebecca took an unsteady step back as it approached. _The eyes._ There were five of them gazing directly into her. Two large red spheres and three tiny bulbs situated between them. Beneath them were the mandibles, powerful, spiked things defending a bottomless void of a mouth.

It opened in that moment, releasing a low groan, and then its body seemed to vibrate. A melodic chirp echoed through the cavernous room and gave the impression of an army, of hundreds of insects crying out in deafening unison. And then the monster lunged.

Rebecca did not have time to think. In a single swoop of self-preservation, old training resurfaced, and she brought up a sneakered foot to kick the thing squarely in the center of its head. The blow was weak, unpracticed, colored with the fatigue of age and misuse. But it did its job.

With a sickening pop, the creature's eyes seemed to burst beneath the pressure, and fluid hit Rebeca's bare calf in a single nauseating wave. She stumbled. But the monster did the same, reeling backward from the contact but not deterred. Its cry grew more powerful, the mind-numbing drone returning with new vigor.

Rebecca took the opportunity to run, shoving Siobhan toward the door before taking the younger woman's wrist in her hand and barreling back out into the park. They ran, past the faded prize stalls, past the shattered visages of long-dead carousel horses, past the discarded costume of a rabbit mascot propped against a bench. The Ferris wheel loomed overhead, the clown at its center watching the scene unfold, the blind idiot god too stupid or too proud to intervene.

"What was that? _What was that_?" Siobhan panted, sneakers kicking up stagnant dirt and mangled weeds. "Oh my God. What was that?"

Rebecca merely tugged her along, shaking her head before speeding to a stop. Her breath was ragged in her throat, and dryness stung her tongue. For the first time, she realized she was shaking, either with adrenaline or cold. The sun was all but gone from the sky, and with the approaching dark came a heavy, lingering chill. It rooted itself in the air and refused to move.

"Which way did we come in?" Rebecca stammered hurriedly, looking down the fence as it rose out the ground ahead of them. In the dim light, the crevice through which they made their entrance seemed to vanish, and with her heart pounding in her ears, Rebecca could not console herself enough to find it again.

"I don't know," Siobhan stammered, taking the opportunity to clutch her wrist in her free hand. Rebecca's nails had dug into her skin there and left deep red marks, but she could barely focus on them. Her attention moved over her shoulder, back toward that godforsaken bathroom and whatever horror waited inside.

As if on cue, the creature reappeared in that moment, scurrying out the doorway and cocking its head around as if testing its surroundings. A scream erupted from the student's throat, and she was running again, seemingly in a random direction down the fence.

"Siobhan! Don't! Wait!" Rebecca shouted, casting the monster a final glance as she took off after her companion. _Not again. Not again._

The pictures in her mind were ancient, dusty remnants of a destroyed city and its destroyed citizens. They fluttered around like moths before taking root, swarming the corners of her subconscious. But Rebecca rallied against them, mustering all her mental fortitude, _keeping them out_. "Siobhan! The fence!"

She saw it. Even in darkness, she saw it, the welcome hole in the iron fence that would provide their escape. Perking her head up, the younger woman cast a glance in its direction before turning back over her shoulder.

"Dr. Chambers!" she shrieked, but before she could get the words out, the older woman felt the thing barrel into her back. The creature leapt through the air, using rudimentary wings to take flight, and it shoved all its strength into her torso. Rebecca flailed as its appendages tore at her garments, as it reared its head down and coated her neck in wet, panting breaths. _I can feel it. Oh God. I can feel it._ The mandibles seemed to skirt her exposed skin, testing the flesh as if searching for the proper place to pierce it.

But then Siobhan was upon them, delivering another kick to the monster, sneakered food landing in and puncturing one swollen red eye. Its contents, fluid, and pus, reeking of iron and rot, splattered the front of her clothing and legs, and the woman froze, staring down at herself as she reconciled what she had just done. But Rebecca used the moment of weakness to roll out from beneath the monster. It fell screeching and writhing on the ground in a puddle of black bile.

Without wasting another moment, the older woman took Siobhan by the hand once more and started toward the hole, but as if to cut them off, a figure emerged up ahead. It was disturbingly tall, slender and elegant, with long arms and an extended neck ending in a thin, curved head.

It was merely a form in the dark, a deep black shadow cast against a backdrop of lighter hues. And Rebecca could see only its shape. It seemed to vibrate as it moved, each appendage shaking at a frightful, electrifying velocity that defied the grace inherent in its design. It cocked its gaze upward, situating itself in their direction before starting forward. _Buzz, buzz, buzz._ The new sound flitted along the breeze, weak among the thrashing death throes of the four-legged beast only a few yards behind them.

Throwing her weight to the side, Rebecca tugged Siobhan into a crevice between two prize stalls, pulling her down the line and trying to put as much distance between them and whatever else walked there as possible.

"Do you think it saw us?" Siobhan whispered hoarsely, having seemingly regained at least some of her senses in the moments since her burst of courage. Rebecca shook her head uncertainly. Whatever _it_ was, she was not keen on lingering too long to have a proper look.

But as if to answer some of the stubborn curiosity, the buzzing grew more violent, climaxing in the sickening wet noise of splattering gore. The fallen monster screeched as if it were being torn apart. Rebecca held her breath, releasing Siobhan's hand to bring up an arm and plant over her chest, holding her firmly against a faded wooden wall. And they listened.

 _The big thing's tearing the other thing apart. It's killing it._ Rebecca swallowed hard, having only just realized how parched her mouth was becoming. And then there was silence, nothing but stagnant air and the distant drone of cicadas in the trees.

"I think it's over," she whispered, sucking in a breath. Her hair was beginning to fall down over her face, and in a sudden fit of irritation, she tugged out her bun and allowed the shaggy brown strands to fall lifelessly to her shoulders.

For a few long moments, she simply breathed, slow steadying breaths meant to quell her pounding heart. But then came the dragging, a distant, low noise but undeniable in its source. A body was being tugged across the dirt, and Siobhan dared to crane her neck, dared to glimpse out the alley in which they had hidden and watch as the elegant figure scurried by, tugging a bundle behind it.

"How are we going to get out?" the student mumbled. "We can't go back that way. I can't go back that way. There's…whatever _that_ is. It's over there."

"There's got to be another way out," Rebecca replied, cocking her head in the other direction. Siobhan nodded weakly, and with a silent sense of agreement, the pair of them began moving along the wall, toward the other end of the alley.

"My phone. I can call the police. They're in the next town over, but…they'll be here. They'll come," Siobhan stammered, as if to reassure herself. Rebecca brought up a hand and offered an affirmative _shh_. A few seconds later, they emerged into an open area littered with picnic tables, some overturned but all ruined by rain and neglect.

A haunted house attraction towered ahead of them, its clapboard turrets and wooden gables obscuring the stars just now beginning to blink to life in the sky. The sign above its entrance read "Madman Manor" in jagged, blood-red letters, and a skeleton with a missing jaw swayed from a noose beside the large wooden entry doors. Rusted carts in the shape of gargoyles, all gaping mouths and ruby eyes, clung to a metal track that once led inside.

Paintings of cartoonish ghosts and the imposing form of a masked man with an axe adorned the building's crumbling exterior, but someone had spray-painted obscenities over the latter's face. Rebecca regarded the scene with a nagging sense of irony as she stepped forward. _God, a mansion and a train in one day. Screw this._

"I think we're okay for now," the older woman said weakly, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Call the police. Tell them a man attacked us, and someone's dead. They won't come if you tell them the truth."

No one had believed them after the Spencer Mansion incident either, and once the public was ready to lend an ear in their direction, it was too late. And her friends and neighbors were taking bites out of one another in the same murky streets she had walked only weeks earlier.

"I'm not getting any reception. Of course I'm not getting a goddamn reception," Siobhan grumbled, pacing back and forth as panic once again threatened to seize her. However, she took a breath and steadied her shaking frame as Rebecca surveyed the area, moving in circles and keeping her eyes open for any signs of movement in the dark.

"Just keep trying. You'll get through eventually," she nodded, offering a small reassuring smile in her direction. Siobhan looked frail, frightened and exhausted, as if her entire world had just crumbled in front of her. And it had, Rebecca knew. She knew all too well, and at least some part of her realized that she was looking at herself. At a young woman thrust into extraordinary circumstances and forced to cope.

But hell, now she was supposed to be the experienced one. She was supposed to have a plan, to have answers, to survive and make sure Siobhan did too. And it sucked. _It sucked hard._

Lost in these thoughts, Rebecca moved for a nearby food stall. Patty's. A burger stand named Patty's. She let out a breath of unamused air, casting her sight on the building's edge, where an old bit of piping had come loose. Bending down, she grasped the metal in her hands and tugged with all her strength until it popped off cleanly in her grasp with a ghastly creak.

It was a bad weapon, she knew. Too heavy to swing quickly and too long to swing gracefully. But it was better than having to use her fists. Her eyes moved downward, to the dark liquid still clinging to her calves. It had begun to settle there, growing sticky as it hardened around her flesh.

"Hello? Hello? Yes, can you hear me?" Siobhan paced back and forth, bringing up one hand to cover her free ear. "Yes! Yes! My name is Siobhan Long. I'm in Woodpine. I'm in Fantasyland at Woodpine, and there was a man. That's right, a man. He attacked me and my friend…I don't know. I don't know."

She was beginning to ramble, and Rebecca, toting the pipe, jogged up beside her, knitting her face in genuine concern. Cocking her head, she listened to the one-sided conversation unfold.

"Calm down, Siobhan. Calm down," she whispered, bringing up a comforting hand to rest on the younger woman's shoulder. She could feel Siobhan trembling beneath her touch, and despite the heaviness of her own hand, she could do nothing to quell the other woman's shaking.

"Shit. Shit. Shit! It went dead again. It went dead again. I lost the stupid signal," the student snapped, looking down at her phone in defeat. Her hand came up to run through her hair before pushing her glasses back into place. They hung raggedly there on her nose, and scattered specks of blood must have splashed across them during their earlier flight.

"It's okay. They know where we are. You got that through, right? They're going to try to call back, so just try to keep the line open," Rebecca nodded, digging her own phone out her pocket and giving it a glance. "No bars."

"Yeah, yeah. You're right. They'll come. They'll come," Siobhan breathed out. For a moment, she took the opportunity to glance at her surroundings. The park had gone quiet, a mausoleum filled with memories of the dead and whatever beasts lurked beyond waking life. "Dr. Chambers…I…what's going on? What are those things? Why is this happening? For God's sake."

"I don't know," Rebecca breathed weakly, squeezing the woman's arm in an effort to be reassuring. "But we're going to get through this, okay? You saved my life back there, yeah? As long as you keep fighting like that, we're going to get out of here." Siobhan nodded, swallowing hard. "And you know, you can call me Rebecca," the older woman continued. "Less of a mouthful to scream."

Siobhan looked up, and for a brief second, her eyes crinkled. A mirthless laugh escaped her mouth, and prompted by this display, Rebecca let out one of her own. The fit of laughter was misplaced, and like the amusement park itself, it lacked the joy it may have possessed. But in its place was relief, reassurance, hope, the assuredness that as long as they were standing, they could get out of this.

However, the affair ended as abruptly as it had begun once the buzzing noise returned. Rebecca cocked her head up, glancing over her shoulder. The figure was there. It moved about in the distance, swaying in place as if it would collapse under its own height. With her eyes adjusting to the darkness, Rebecca could make out more of it this time. Its lower back seemed to end in a point, and its fingers curled outward into long, thin spines. Not claws, but needles. Although it tilted its head around, taking in its surroundings, it did not seem to know there were other intruders roaming its domain.

Siobhan stiffened, breath stopping in her throat as she caught the shadow moving across the park. Rebecca looked around a moment before angling her head as a signal to follow, and with her partner at her heels, she jogged toward the haunted house ahead and tugged on the heavy wooden door.

It opened just enough in her grasp for Siobhan to slip through into the dark, and with a final look at the thing lurking in the faraway shadows, Rebecca slunk in after her, letting the gateway slam shut behind them with a clank.

"I hate these rides," Siobhan mumbled, bringing her cell phone up and flicking on its flashlight. It cast the tunnel ahead in an eerie white glow, bouncing off crudely painted walls and dusty, corroded mannequins arranged in a series of grim poses.

The metal tracks at their feet continued down the corridor before vanishing around a corner. To their right, a zombielike dummy coated in fake blood hung down from the ceiling—as if he were meant to pop out from a trap and his machinery had malfunctioned.

Across from him was a plastic woman in a maid's uniform, soaked in gore, clutching an unconvincing severed head in her outstretched hand. Dead strobe lights and narrow nozzles, perhaps for fog, dotted the ceiling, and Siobhan gnawed on her lip as she ran her light over them.

Bringing it back down, the woman jumped at the sight of a large, skeletal figure up ahead. It was half-hidden behind a section of movable wall, poking its head out at the end of the walkway. Regaining her composure, Siobhan let out an embarrassed sigh, pushing her hair out her face.

"We can just wait here until the cops arrive," Rebecca sighed, slumping against the wall. The pipe was a heavy weight in her hand, and she let it dangle freely at her legs as she closed her eyes and tried once more to fight the adrenaline rushing through her veins.

"How will they know we're in here?"

"Hopefully they open fire on that thing, and we know when to come out, huh?" Rebecca laughed weakly, flashing the other woman a sympathetic look.

"Great," Siobhan replied, shrugging her shoulders. She kicked at the female mannequin with a dull grunt, letting the light in her hand fall to her side and dangle idly at her hip. "I feel so helpless."

"It'll be alright. Any bars on your phone?"

"Let me check," Siobhan sighed, bringing the device up to her face and squinting. "None. You know, it's hard enough getting a signal out in the streets around here. Anything on yours?"

"I don't think so." Rebecca shook her head, fishing her own phone, a notably outdated model, from her pocket once more. The screen blinked a few times, and she narrowed her eyes at it and let out a breath of air. "I think it's going to die soon. Three-hour train ride and nothing to do, you know?"

The glance that Siobhan flashed her was sympathetic, and falling against the wall, she collapsed, closing her eyes and allowing her body to slide down toward the floor. For a few moments, the pair of them simply sat in silence, waiting for the cavalry to rush in and save them. But for now, there was only the quiet, the oppressive, all-encompassing stillness of Fantasyland surrounding them.

At the very least, there was no more buzzing, and Siobhan imagined that the monster must have wandered elsewhere, to do whatever it is monsters do. She sighed, biting her lip. Her thoughts flickered outward, outside the murky confines of the abandoned attraction in which she now found herself. To a mother, a father, to an older sister, and summers spent life-guarding on the Jersey shore. All of it felt unreal now; this, this macabre carnival was her reality. And whatever lurked inside it, it consumed her, shrouding her in its suffocating embrace.

Just as she began to drift off into something akin to slumber, however, a light foggy grogginess settling over her limbs, she sat upright, eyes widening as a burst of air shot out her nostrils. Rebecca glanced up from across the hall.

"What is it? What's wrong?"

"Do you hear that?" Siobhan whispered, voice hoarse. The older woman paused, craning her neck to listen. Nothing but the building's relative quiet echoed in her ears, but then she heard it. _Chirping_. Scores of it, ringing from somewhere deeper in the tunnel. Her thoughts flashed momentarily to the man in that disgusting, festering bathroom. To the creature that had burst from his back only to be slaughtered by another creature unknown.

"Don't move, alright? Stay here," Rebecca said hurriedly, bringing up a hand as if not to allow any protest.

"No….No, I don't want to. I'm coming." Siobhan shook her head and scrambled to her feet, brushing off her pants. Her hand met a sticky bloodstained near her upper thigh, and she reared back, visibly repulsed.

Rebecca offered a sharp nod before starting down the path, her partner at her heels. The younger woman brought up her phone, letting the flashlight illuminate their path, bouncing off the walls at bizarre angles and casting the rotten, forgotten decorations in a strange otherworldly glow.

As they rounded the corner, Siobhan seemed to tense, sinking in closer to her companion as if in search of protection. But Rebecca did not look back; her gait was steady and her purpose defined.

Ahead was a large wooden bed with an embroidered comforter and pillows yellowed with age. By now, its canopy had collapsed, but the dismembered legs of some forgotten mannequin still stuck out from beneath the billowing fallen drapes. Rebecca glanced over it briefly as the light brought it to life, but her attention was suddenly drawn downward. _Crack_. _Crack. Crack_.

Each step brought another brittle crunch, and the older woman glanced backward as if in search of an answer. Siobhan, pale-faced and wide-eyed, merely brought the flashlight downward.

"It's the blue cicada. Its shells," she mumbled, dazed. There were hundreds of them on the floor. Skins, outer skeletons, abandoned by insects that had long since outgrown them. Now they sat brittle with age, coating their feet in a dull blue carpet of organic waste.

Rebecca clutched at her arms, bumps trailing up her exposed skin. She shivered, but by now, the distant chirping was growing louder, and with nothing else to do, she pushed onward. _It's just bugs, Rebecca. You can deal with bugs._

With Siobhan close behind, she rounded another corner and froze as the narrow beam of light skated its way upward. And there was the source of the buzzing. There were droves of them, all shimmering blue, crawling up the walls and across the ceiling. Blue cicadas, _Tibicen Lazulinus_ , fashioning themselves in a makeshift nest, pulsating there like a heart in the dark. They chirped and buzzed, crawling over one another, all skittering legs and wide, black eyes.

But Rebecca was not looking at them. She was looking at the thing in the center of their midst. It resembled the four-legged beast from earlier, deep blue with large, red eyes. But dark hair hung down its face in streaks, concealing its vision and knotting itself in its gaping maw.

"Ah," Siobhan stammered, stumbling back as more exoskeletons crunched beneath her sneakers.

"It's not moving," Rebecca faltered after a pause. She stared the monster in the face, but it stood frozen as cicadas swarmed over its frame. _A hole in its back?_

But then the chirping grew, blossoming into a crescendo before culminating in a cacophony of noise. The last thing Rebecca saw before the room went dark was a whirling swarm of blue taking flight in her direction.

There was a hand on her wrist, and she was being pulled, pipe dangling at her side. Around a corner, and then around another, the buzzing returning to a distant whirr as the entrance came back into view, moonlight filtering in through the slits in the door.

Rebecca blinked, and Siobhan brought her phone back up, flashlight blinking back to life.

"Why did you do that?" Rebecca stammered breathlessly, glancing around. No cicadas. No frozen monsters. Just darkness.

"The light. They were flying towards the light," the student breathed. "I'm sorry. I…They're harmless…I just…That thing…That monster. I panicked."

"It wasn't…It wasn't moving. It was…I don't know." Rebecca shook her head, clutching her arms again as bumps bristled their way across her skin. "It had a hole in its back. I think it was dead."

"A hole in its back?" Siobhan asked. She could feel the remnants of the cicadas on the bottom of her shoes, and her mind began to turn. "That's…that's how Tibicen Lazulinus molts. It bursts out the back of its exoskeleton."

"You don't think…?" Rebecca asked, eyebrows shooting up.

"No…no, no, no," Siobhan mumbled, shaking her head. "Dr. Chambers…Rebecca….If that was a shell, doesn't that just mean there's a bigger version of it running around in here?"


End file.
